One problem for web advertisers and others that want information about a computer user is identifying the user. Web advertisers, for example, may want to target advertisements to users. The most common method for identifying a user is through browser cookies. A cookie may be a text string that the browser returns with each request and that each response can add to, update, or delete.
Unfortunately, cookies are perishable. That is, cookies may be deleted by a user, may expire, or may be forced out of the browser cookie store by other cookies. Additionally, browsers may only accept a limited number of cookies from any domain. There are other limitations on cookies as well. Browsers may limit cookies to 1024 characters of text. Cookies may be specific to each browser on a computer and different browsers on the same computer may have different cookies. Also, different computers may have the same user but may have different cookies. For these and other reasons, it may be difficult to target advertisements, for example, to an individual user.
One solution to the problems associated with the perishable nature of cookies is to have users identify themselves. Such identification may be accomplished by requiring the users to log-in each time they want to use a site. The requirement for a log-in may present a more secure website, useful for those that provide financial transactions or otherwise require personal data. This requirement, however, may deter casual users and thus may reduce wanted user traffic on other types of sites.
Therefore, there is a need for enabling web servers to identify users without deterring casual users or otherwise reducing traffic. The solution should take into account the perishable nature of browser cookies.